The present invention relates generally to a carton for the storage, shipping and display of articles, and more particularly, to a carton which is convertible from a substantially closed form to an opened form for displaying articles, especially articles in the form of tapered primary containers, such as stand-up pouches. The carton of this invention is formed with weakened lines or tear lines for facilitating the carton being opened and divided into two sections connected along a fold line. The two sections of the carton are then pivoted to a position alongside of each other to expose the articles in a manner to effectively display the articles.
Pouches are used for packaging a variety of products in liquid or in dry form. A typical stand-up pouch has a generally flat bottom to support the pouch in its stand-up position and is tapered to the top. At the top, the front and rear walls of the pouch are in adjacent, sealed relationship to each other. As viewed from the side, such pouches have a generally triangular configuration with a thin top and a thick bottom but as viewed from the front, the bottom is narrower than the top.
Because of the irregular configuration of a pouch discussed above, packaging a quantity of pouches for shipment or the display of multiple pouches has always been a problem. For example, various forms of chipboard trays may be loaded with the stand-up pouches and then placed within a further shipping carton. This arrangement, due to the irregular shape of the pouches, resulted in larger shipping cartons which increased the cost for manufacturing since more material was required. To reduce the costs and labor requirements associated with conventional packages used to transport stand-up pouches, shipping and display cartons such as those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,927,498 to Saam have also been developed. The Saam carton allows two rows of irregularly shaped stand-up pouches to be nested or interleaved during shipping. The Saam carton has weakened lines in the front, top, rear and base such that the carton can be severed into two sections that serve as two display trays on which the pouches are displayed. When separated, the two sections are moved in opposite directions so that the two rows of pouches also separate from each other and move with the display trays respectively. By this means, the two rows of pouches are automatically displayed on the two trays respectively without requiring additional handling. This way of separation, however, would result in two discrete trays that are subject to mutual displacement, which does not always agree with the tidy appearance required of a display device at retail stores. The Saam carton can alternatively provide two connected trays to maintain them in a side-to-side aligned relationship. To provide such connected trays, the weakened line in the base of the carton remains unbroken, and thus the two sections of the carton are required to pivot about the unbroken weakened line to bring the two sections into a side-by-side position. During the pivotal movement, either section of the carton would interfere at its top with the pouches on the other section such that efficient separation of the two rows is hindered. This would result in dislodging of some of the pouches from the display trays during the conversion of the carton into the trays.
Accordingly, there exists a need for a shipping and storage carton or package for tapered articles which may easily be converted into a pair of connected display trays. Such a carton or package should be divided into two sections that can be pivoted about a fold line to allow the two packaged rows of articles to easily separate from each other as the two sections are pivoted.